


this might as well happen

by owedbetter



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Coronavirus is the villain, F/M, Podfic Available, and they were ROOMMATES, partially based on a true story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 23:42:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26307259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owedbetter/pseuds/owedbetter
Summary: Stranded in a foreign country during a pandemic, Zuko has a crazy idea.
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 50
Kudos: 213





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is partially based on a true story: my story. A lot of what happens in this fic happened to me. Yes, I am projecting. No one look at me. 
> 
> I wrote this for me and me only. This was meant to be a oneshot but I got carried away (but that's just how I am as a person, apparently) so I've split it up into chapters for better readability. 
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> This chapter is available as a podfic on **[Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/episode/74EWdgvECPmcm6tEOCMUGN?si=o7kKog-4RwS6nDz--Mg5tA)**!

_Cover art by Ysa AKA @avenuecab ([Twitter](https://twitter.com/avenuecab) / [Tumblr](https://avenuecab.tumblr.com) )_

_(You can reblog/retweet this art on[Tumblr](https://owedbetter.tumblr.com/post/642542326440394752/stranded-in-a-foreign-country-during-a-pandemic) / [Twitter](https://twitter.com/PAlNTEDLADY/status/1358709812637233153). Please do not repost.)_

* * *

“ _Part of me was like, ‘whatever’. You know?  
You know those days when you’re like ‘this might as well happen’?  
Adult life is already so goddamn weird._”

\- John Mulaney, “ _New in Town_ ”

* * *

Something in him wanted to laugh.

And underneath his uncomfortably thick N95 mask, he was. The material was too hard as it pressed against the bridge of his nose. Last night, he was mentally preparing to wear it for 28 hours straight. A lot can change between yesterday and the time you were trying to check-in your bags at airport security during a pandemic, though.

Zuko sat just by the other check-in counter where there was an older man who was helping passengers check in their irregularly shaped bags. Heathrow Airport had never quite looked like this before. He saw plenty of people with their own suitcases and neck pillows. He saw white people incorrectly wearing their masks just below their nose. There were sanitation stations just about every four feet. There was a Caffè Nero, closed of course, on the other side of the check-in area.

Next to him was his trolley with his four large suitcases, a backpack, and a laptop bag. The seat to the other side of him was blocked off with a sign that no one was to sit there for the sake of social distancing; all of the seats in Heathrow Airport were covered in the same. Not too far from him was the long queue of other passengers who were also trying to check in with Ba Sing Se Airways. From where he was sitting, he could just about hear the same speech that was said to him not more than ten minutes ago.

He stared at the floor. He smirked at nothing, though no one could see it, and he chuckled.

“Fuck sake,” he whispered finally. “Of course this would happen. Fucking sh—this might as well happen.”

Zuko sighed and pulled out his phone from his back pocket. She shouldn’t have gotten far. It was only about half an hour since he got out of her car in the first place. But then again, he knew how June liked to drive. He found her phone number and dialled. She didn’t pick up. Zuko tried again. She picked up after the third ring with a grunt. He knew he would be on speaker, her phone connected to her car’s sound system.

“What now, Pouty?” said June.

“Yeah,” he said. “Listen, I’m—I’m going to need you to come back and pick me up again.”

Zuko heard the car’s horn. It was loud through his phone’s speaker and he had to hold his phone away a little. He cringed. He heard the screech of rubber against asphalt and he assumed it was June stalling to the side of the road.

“You _what?_ ” she said after a long pause.

“The airline fucked up. They told me so at the desk,” he said. “I’m stuck again.”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” she said.

“That’s exactly what I said.”

“Why can’t you call a cab company? I’m already on the fucking highway.”

“Because I don’t fucking want to—!” he nearly yelled, though muffled by the mask. He stopped and sighed, forcing himself to calm down. His shoulders dropped. “Could-could you _please_ just not make this more difficult than it is?”

June paused. Though he could not see her, he knew she was rolling her eyes. Zuko’s leg shook.

“Ugh, fine. But I’m charging you extra,” she said, exasperated through the phone. He could hear the car start up again on her end. “Listen, I’m already at the highway, next U-turn’s not for a while, have to stop for gas and shit, and traffic’s already picking up. I’ll be an hour and I’ll meet you at the same parking spot. _Don’t_ make me wait.”

“Okay,” he said.

“And you’re buying our groceries for a month.”

Zuko rolled his eyes. “Whatever you want, June,” he said. “Thanks.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” she said. “Don’t make this a habit.”

She hung up and that was that.

* * *

Katara could not quite place the feeling at the pit of her stomach.

Was it an impending sense of dread? Was it the sweet, heat of stomach acid bubbling up her throat? Her legs felt weak. Her knees would not stop shaking. The air tasted heavy, like rust—and somehow that made sense. She swallowed, and rolled her trolley to the desk as the socially distant man in front of her waved for her as she was next in the queue.

A dark skinned woman greeted her, half of her face covered with a thin blue mask and her locs neatly arranged to a bun atop her head with a small, neat green hat pinned to it, as all the other ground crew were wearing. From her eyes, Katara knew she was smiling. She hoped that the smile she gave behind her mask let the woman know she was doing the same.

“Passport, please,” said the woman. Katara presented her passport and her printed ticket, hoping to get her boarding pass. She drummed her hands atop the desk in a nondescript beat. Her toes curled inside her boots.

“Just you?” the woman asked.

“Just me,” she replied.

“Where are you headed off to today?”

“Oh, uh—Singapore,” she answered.

A pause. The woman raised a neatly done brow at her and blinked. Katara swallowed and grit her teeth.

“Just a moment.”

The woman picked up her telephone and dialled a number.

“Sure,” said Katara, taking in a deep, sharp breath. The woman was practically whispering to the phone and Katara could not hear from the other side of the plastic shield that was between them. The woman hung up the phone.

“It-it’s just a layover,” she tried to explain, gesturing with shaking hands. “Connecting flight’s with Jetstar to Manila, and—”

“Yes, I see…” said the woman, looking over Katara’s shoulder. The woman gestured for someone behind her. Katara turned her head to see that a tall, older white man, also wearing a thin blue mask, had materialised next to her. He was not wearing his mask correctly as the mask sat just beneath his nose. She took a step back.

“Madam, could you come with me, please?” he asked.

“I’m sorry?” was her reply. She stepped back and put a hand against her heart. Her head swiftly looked back and forth between Check-In Woman and Sudden Helper Man.

“Is… is there something wrong?” she asked the woman.

“Well, you see, madam—we’re very sorry to say this but it’s just that Singapore’s current travel restrictions state that only citizens and permanent residents are allowed into the country.”

Her jaw felt as if it had detached from her head and fell to the floor. Katara could only stare at the woman with big, blue, disbelieving eyes.

“But-but,” she started. It almost sounded as if she were about to laugh. Out of breath. “I-I’m not _actually_ coming into the country, I’m just connecting—I mean, I-I’m not going into Singapore, I’m just passing through—”

“We understand but those are the rules, madam, I’m so sorry.”

“But it was your customer support that booked this flight!” she said, her voice steadily rising. Her throat felt tight. “I mean, h-h-how could they not have known—y-you people were the ones who _gave_ me this flight!”

“ _Madam—_ ”

“No! No, no, no! And you people have cancelled on me four different times in just as many months! You… y-you can’t just—” she said. The man tried to reach for her but she quickly put her hands up and stepped back in defence. Her eyes stung with hot tears and she hated how swiftly they appeared and ran down her cheek. Her chest rose and fell with her heavy breaths. She tasted acid at the back of her throat.

“Are you kidding me right now? Are you _fucking_ kidding me?” she asked, her voice breaking.

“Madam, I am so very sorry to say this. It has been a common complaint throughout the day and we’re working hard to sort things out for you. If you just move aside and let us see what we can do to rebook—”

“Rebook? Are you joking?” Katara asked, cutting her off. “I don’t have anywhere else to go! I’ve been stuck here for four fucking months, I’m only here on a tourist visa—“

“Ba Sing Se Airways will, of course, cover your accommodation until such time that—”

“So I can be locked in a room on my own for weeks when I’ve already been doing that for the last _four_ months?” she asked. She knew how loud she was being. She could feel the stares of the people still in the queue and knew that they were hoping against hope that this wasn’t the same case for them. But it was. And it would be.

Katara sniffled and stood in front of the check-in counter and leaned toward the plastic shield. She pleaded, “Please, I’m so, so sorry, I don’t mean to be difficult but I… I just want to go _home_.”

Check-In Woman pushed her glasses up her nose and looked to Katara with sympathy. Hers were kind but tired eyes. She has been on shift, having had to deliver the same news over and over again, to correct a mistake she did not make. Katara watched her shoulders sag ever so slightly as she maintained her professional equanimity.

Katara knew then that there was nothing left to do. The moment that the woman began to speak again, she closed her eyes and began to cry in earnest.

“Madam, I am very, very sorry but there is nothing that we can do. There are no direct flights with this airline going from London to Manila, and both Singapore and Manila airports are restricting flights from the UK. In Singapore, only citizens and permanent residents are allowed into the country,” she said. “Please collect your check-in baggage and a Ba Sing Se Airways representative will be in touch with you shortly about your accommodations.”

“But—” she tried once more but found no other words would come to mind and she could not find her voice. She sniffled again and shook her head. “Fine. Thank you for your help—and I’m sorry for raising my voice, I—”

“It’s alright, ma’am. I understand,” said the woman. “Please take care and keep safe.”

* * *

“So there’s _nothing_ you can do?” Suki asked, with Sokka right beside her. Katara nodded at her phone screen.

“Nothing,” she said. “Not a damn thing.” She sniffled, her voice breaking. “Sokka, I’m out of money. And I can’t ask you and Suki for more—”

“Hey, hey—” her brother interrupted. “Don’t even worry about it. We’ve got you.”

“But Sokka—”

“Don’t _but Sokka_ me,” he said. “Shut it. We’re taking care of you and you don’t get a choice about i—ah, fuck.” She could hear the distant wail of a baby in the background. “That’s Senna, hang on.”

Sokka pulled his earphone from his ear and leapt up and away from the screen.

“No, it’s okay,” said Katara. “I’ll let you guys sleep.”

“We don’t get much of that right now anyway,” Suki replied with a little, tired smile on her face.

“How are you feeling?”

“Very pregnant, very swollen,” her sister-in-law replied. “Very tired of making sushi bake platters. But it’s been a hit, financially, so we can’t really complain, you know? So you don’t have to worry about us, I promise. Let us worry about you.”

“Thanks, Suki,” she said. “I just can’t believe this is happening.”

“It’s frustrating, I get it,” she agreed. “The airline said they’ll take care of accommodations, right?”

“They said so but I don’t know. Might be a long wait. It looks like there’s a lot of people this is happening to. My flight was supposed to leave in an hour.”

“I’m so sorry, Katara,” she said. “We’ll make this work, okay?” In the background, Katara could hear the distant wail of a child still crying, despite her father’s best efforts. Suki returned her gaze to the phone and said, “I’m sorry, I think have to go.”

“Yeah, of course,” she said. “I’ll talk to you guys tomorrow.”

“Be safe out there, alright?” said Suki. “Take care.”

“Bye, Suki.”

“Bye!”

Katara ended the call and pocketed her phone. She then reached for her hand sanitiser in her bag and applied a generous amount of the gel on her hands. She slumped down the cool, grey, metal seat and resigned herself to wait miserably in this airport for the next few hours, feeling more and more like Tom Hanks in “The Terminal”. In the worst parts of her imagination, she thought that that might be the situation she found herself in then—stranded in a foreign airport for months. And she didn’t even know how to do construction work.

Just then, as she mused silently while staring at nothing in particular, she noticed a presence approach her from the side.

“Excuse me,” said the stranger. “Hello.”

“Hi,” she said, inching away instinctively. The young man was wearing a thin mask and a face shield as well though. The distinct, large burn mark on his face made her think that he looked a little familiar. Like a distant story she could only just about remember. She raised a brow and crossed her arms against her chest. “You’re standing a little close, could you please not?”

“Sorry—sorry, I mean, I tested negative just yesterday. I can prove it, I just—” he said, stepping back and mimicking her posture with his arms across his chest, though it more looked like he was holding himself. She saw his thumb brush against his arm in a self-soothing motion. “I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation with the ground crew. And just now.”

“You were eavesdropping on me?”

“A little bit,” he admitted. That made her quirk her head.

“Rude,” she said. “But why admit it?”

“I… well, I’m kind of in the same situation,” he said, scratching the back of his neck.

“You were going to Manila too?”

“Yep,” he said. “Been here for six months.”

“Alone?”

“Yep.”

“Damn, and I thought I had it bad—”

“It wasn’t that bad, actually,” he said. “My mom owns a house here, just three hours outside of London. I was there on my own for most of the whole thing.”

“Oh,” Katara considered. She looked away from him to the side and to the other, unsure of what to say next. “Well… okay?”

“This is… well, t-t-this is going to sound kind of really crazy,” he said. He was rocking back and forth, switching the shift of his weight between his one foot forward and the other. He could not look her in the eye. “But do you… maybe, just, I don’t know, want to, uh—how do I say this without sounding like a total creep, uh—” It was at that that Katara moved her head back and blinked rapidly at him. “Do want to stay in my house with me?”

“ _No,_ ” she replied immediately. She narrowed her eyes at him. “ _What?_ Are you insane?”

“I know what it sounds like, just-just hear me out—” he tried, gesturing defensively with his hands. “But, man, if I have to spend one more month, one week, one _day_ alone without there being anyone else there in the house to fucking talk to, I think I might actually lose my mind.”

Though he could not see it behind her masked façade, her mouth was wide open. Her jaw was practically on the floor. Big, blue eyes stared at him. She could feel herself shaking her head. “Tui and La, you’re actually serious.”

“Coronavirus, am I right?” he tried to joke, shrugging his shoulders.

“You don’t know if I’m positive.”

“You’re here in practically full PPE. I’ve seen you sanitise your hands twice in ten minutes just because you held your own stuff,” he explained. “I think I can take my chances with you. But I’d pay for a swab test for you, if you want.” A pause. “I’m… I’m kind of rich. Sorry.”

“Why are you sorry?”

“I…” he started. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t even know my name,” she said.

“Katara,” he said. “I heard the ground crew lady say it and the woman on the phone just now, I’m not like a stalker or anything.”

“You know that’s exactly what a stalker would say,” she pointed out.

“You can look me up if that helps,” he said. “My name is Zuko Ignacio.” He pointed to his face. “The scar’s pretty hard to fake.”

“Ignacio, I… I know that name,” she said. “Your sister is Azula Ignacio.”

“Yep,” he replied curtly.

“Your dad—”

“I know,” he said quickly. “I know who my dad is.”

“Are you serious?”

“About… about my dad being—?” he said, his brows furrowed, perplexed. She cut him off.

“No, about the _house_.”

“Oh,” he said, his posture relaxing. “Yes. Yeah, actually. I am.”

“I… I’m going to be honest,” she said. “Your plan is… _insane_ —but, man, I have to say I’m kind of tempted. I don’t know if I can last a few more weeks alone either.” A pause. Katara bit her lip. She turned away from him and spoke to herself aloud, saying, “ _What am I doing? Why am I considering this?_ ”

“I can pay for everything, money’s not an issue—”

“Must be nice,” she commented.

“What I’m trying to say is… it—it would be nice to just have someone else around. Literally just about anyone else.”

“Then why me?” she asked. “Why not ask someone else?”

“You’re the only other person in here who’s alone and my age, I think, so maybe it’ll work? And we’re trying to get back to same country so, you know. We might understand each other a bit better. And it’s not a big house or anything but too big for one person,” he explained.

“How do you know how old I am?”

“I guessed,” he said. “20s, right?”

“I’m 26,” she answered.

“And I’m 28,” he said. “And we’re kind of—uh, literally in the same boat. Same flight and everything. 11:40 to Singapore connecting to Manila, right?”

“You’re… this is crazy, no offence,” she said. “But holy shit, I’m probably also losing my mind for even considering this.”

“I’ve been here on my own for longer,” he explained. “More brain damage that way.” Katara almost smiled. Zuko continued, “I mean, you can always change your mind and go to the accommodation they’re promising you. Any time you want. I… I’m not trying to kidnap you or anything.”

“Are you _this_ lonely?” she asked.

“Aren’t you?” he asked. Katara could not think of anything else to say then.

Zuko then bowed his head and held himself tighter. She could tell by the way his knuckles tightened around his arms.

“You know what, forget it,” he said, stammering quickly. “I-y-you don’t have to do this. I-I-I can just go—I just… It was just an idea, it was a stupid idea, I-I thought I might ask, that’s all. I-I’m sorry for bothering you. Sorry. _Sorry_.”

Before she could say anything else, Zuko ducked his head and was wheeling his own trolley away. He did not look back at her once. She watched him walk toward the other end of Heathrow Airport, far away from her. Katara stared, mouth agape behind her mask.

After a few more moments of stunned silence, she took her phone from her pocket. She dialled Suki’s FaceTime number and her sister-in-law picked up after two rings.

“Katara?” Suki asked, her voice almost whispering. It was 4AM in the Philippines and she could barely see anything but the outline of Suki holding the phone up while Sokka was rocking a now sleeping Senna in his arms. “Is something wrong? Are you okay?”

She looked back to the young man at the other end of the airport. From this distance, she could see he was looking at his phone. Her heart was racing in her chest.

‘ _What am I doing? Why am I doing this?_ ’

“Katara?” Suki asked again. Katara took a deep breath and exhaled.

“So, this is going to sound insane…”

* * *

Zuko wanted the ground to open up and swallow him whole.

He replayed the conversation in his head over and over again like he was putting himself through his own personal hell loop. His toes curled inside his boots and his leg shook uncontrollably. June had not replied to his texts. Part of him wondered if he should just wait by the parking spot, out there in the cold, so he could at least suffer without having her bear witness.

“Fuck, what was I thinking?” he muttered to himself. “Stupid, stupid, stupid—”

But he stopped when he watched that same young woman wheel her trolley. Was she walking towards him? He could only stare, unblinking. Maybe she wasn’t walking towards him. Maybe she was just going to Caffè Nero—yes, it was closed, but he had no business judging her actions. She could do whatever the hell she wanted, right? But the more she walked, the more it looked like she was headed straight to him.

Zuko swallowed.

“Hey,” she greeted.

“Hey,” he said, looking up at her, not knowing if he should stand. He could feel that his hand was shaking.

“This isn’t some kind of… weird… convoluted… pick up social experiment, is it?” Katara asked. “Like, you’re not trying to hit on me, right?”

“N-no, I—?” he answered. He stared at her, brows furrowed. The look in her eyes was deadly serious. “ _What?_ ”

That answer seemed to satisfy her for some reason.

“Okay…” she said. “I talked to my brother and sister… and yes, it’s ridiculous and crazy… _but_ —”

“You’ll… you’ll do it?” he said, voice rising.

“I assume you have your own washer and dryer?”

“Of course,” he replied without hesitation.

“Then I’m in.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> P.S. This story has a [**matching spotify playlist**](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3diIoru69z3mdyr1H6kv1y?si=_XWjZq60Q_S7a4hODJ-7uQ) for the entire fic, if you're into that. Not necessary to enjoy the story but it's there!
> 
>  **EDIT AS OF 10 OCTOBER 2020** : In the original version of TMAWH, everyone in the story was Filipino. However, after some correction, I was kindly and correctly informed that this was culturally insensitive to erase Katara and Sokka's heritage that was directly based on Inuit culture. I apologise for this lapse in judgement and I have corrected this in the plot. I will work to not commit this same mistake again and I thank you for the faith you've placed in me for believing I'm capable of doing better. I hope to earn that faith and trust in future work here and hereonafter. 
> 
> Now, Katara and Sokka only live in the Philippines and speak the language, for the purposes of the plot since the characters being on the same flight is necessary. But Katara and Sokka remain Inuuk. I'm just going to say that Suki is Filipino, and Sokka and Katara moved to the country for school when she was 17 and he was 19 (where he then met Suki). In the current timeline, Katara is 26, Sokka and Zuko are 28, Suki is 29. I hope this clears things up!
> 
> I'm very sorry for my ignorance and thank you so much for being here! x


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good Lord, okay. The problem with this no longer being a one-shot like I thought it would be just means I keep adding more and more self-indulgence into it and I have no one to stop me. So, have overly detailed descriptions of this house that I 100% spent way too much time planning.
> 
> Translations at the end.

“ _I normally don’t notice people. I zone out constantly._  
 _Have you ever zoned out for a few minutes? I’ve been zoned out since 2014._ ”

\- John Mulaney, “ _Night of Too Many Stars_ ” (2017)

* * *

They walked side by side in complete, awkward silence.

Every so often, one of them would throw a glance towards the other’s way and then quickly take back the stare, respective gazes firmly on the bags on their trolleys. The air between them felt thick and each breath felt like it was trapped in their throats. Not a word was said between them but they knew that they were both thinking the same thing: ‘ _This is insane._ ’

For the most part, Katara followed his lead through the airport, which was easy enough, considering that he was the one of them who knew where they were going. A few minutes after she’d agreed to his insane plan, he’d gotten a text and pocketed his phone before he could reply. He’d simply stood and gestured for her to follow him, and she had.

There is often nothing left to do in the conscious quiet except think and regret.

She kept her grip tight, too tight, on her trolley, and struggled to keep it rolling as both as fluidly and as seemingly effortless as possible. She loathed to think that she looked like she needed help with even this. And if she kept her focus on just this airport trolley, she would not have the time to second-guess this decision. Her throat felt tighter by the second. She could not feel her heartbeat—either it was beating too fast or it had stopped altogether. She grit her teeth and forced herself to focus only on the detail of her luggage and the footsteps of the man she was following now.

Zuko pressed the button for the lift and gestured for her to step in first. She rolled in and he followed. He pushed the button for the right floor.

‘ _Doors closing,_ ’ said the disembodied voice of the lift. There wasn’t even any kind, generic music to help fill the lead-heavy silence between two pandemic-crossed strangers. She felt her toes curl in her boots. She fought the urge to rock on the balls of her feet.

“So,” Katara tried. “Are we taking the tube or something?”

“What?” he asked.

“Stupid question but where are we going?” she asked again. It sounded like a joke when she said it but it could not have been more serious. “How are we getting to your house? Like, what—did… did you _drive?_ ”

“Wha-I-no, no, I— _June_ ,” he replied. “I called June.”

“And June is?”

Zuko looked at her and she saw his one good eye widen. The second he took to pause and think stretched to centuries. As if he were only just _now_ realising the situation he’d put them in.

“… _June,_ ” he said, like a whispered curse. Like he’d just been punched in the gut. “ _Shit._ ” Katara blinked at him and said nothing else. “I didn’t tell June—fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck—”

‘ _Doors opening,_ ’ said the disembodied voice of the lift.

Zuko stepped out of the lift and Katara followed. His were long, powerful strides. There was an urgency in his step that hadn’t been there before.

“What’s happening?” she whispered, nearly hissed, as she trailed behind him.

“Just—just play it cool,” he said in the same tone. “Pretend we know each other. She won’t ask questions.”

She didn’t have the time to question him more as she saw the masked woman resting by the large black van. Despite the chill in the London air, she had a dark, sleeveless top that showed the tattoo on her shoulder. Her long, dark hair covered nearly half her face. When the woman saw them, she tossed her hair over her shoulder with a simple jerk of the head.

‘ _I guess this is June_ ,’ Katara thought.

And June was looking directly at her and she raised a brow before she asked Zuko, “Who’s this? Your _girlfriend?_ ”

Heat rose to her cheeks lightning-quick as she immediately responded with, “ _I’m not his girlfriend!_ ”

At the same time, Zuko blurted, “ _She’s not my girlfriend!_ ”

June scoffed and rolled her eyes. She clicked on her car’s remote and the lights blinked to life.

“Whatever, I don’t actually give a shit,” she said, shrugging and waving a hand at them. She sounded not tired but as if she had simply run out of whatever care she could affect her tone with. “Just load up and get in.”

Without another word, June went to the driver’s seat and waited. Katara could only stare at Zuko. And though he could not see behind her mask, she hoped that he could feel how her mouth was open with disbelief. She blinked wide eyes at him.

“Yeah,” he said. “Like I said, I didn’t exactly plan this.”

“No kidding,” she replied. “You didn’t tell her?”

“I panicked, okay?”

“What am I supposed to say?”

“She won’t ask, it’s fine.”

“And if she does?”

“Just make something up, I don’t know,” he hissed. Katara heard a clicking sound and Zuko immediately went to open the back door of the van. The last row of seats were folded upward to make room for all the luggage.

“You go on in,” he said, lifting his first bag from the trolley. “I’ll take care of this.”

“I can help—”

“You don’t have to,” he said.

But, before he could interject further, Katara had already heaved her largest suitcase onto the van. “I know.”

Zuko sighed. “Suit yourself.”

Together, they loaded their luggage to the back of the van with considerable ease, with a natural, unspoken coordination. At the front, Katara could feel June’s gaze from the front-view mirror and she tried not to look. When Katara was loading her last bag into the van, he gathered both trolleys to return it to the appropriate point. She gave him a questioning look and he only shrugged.

“Just get in,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

Katara did not get in the car and simply rested by the back of the van. By the time he got back to the car, she had her arms crossed against her chest. She raised a brow, daring him to question her, and Zuko only rolled his eyes. The pair of them got into the remaining back seats of the car, Katara to the left and Zuko on the other. They sanitised their hands the second they sat down with the bottle of sanitiser that was where the cupholder was meant to be. June started the car before they got their seatbelts on.

The drive started out slow and silent. Taylor Swift’s “Lover” (2019) was playing on a loop in the car’s radio, the volume on low. Out her window, Katara watched as the buildings blended into highway fences and fields. In the sky, the afternoon sun was glorious. Bright blue with small patches of wispy clouds.

June drove swiftly and with hardly any regard for traffic safety, but at just careful enough that she was not pulled over. Her blue eyes watched the grey of the city turn into green of the fields right before her eyes, the other cars that passed by them lower than where she was sat because of the van’s height.

Next to her, Zuko had taken off his face shield and his N95 mask and kept it in a sealed, plastic container that he then shoved into his backpack. She mimicked the gesture as she took off her own face shield and mask, sealed it, and kept it in her bag to dispose of later. She sanitised her hands again and it was then that she saw him take a small green bottle of O’Keeffe’s hand cream and applied it liberally to his hands up to his forearms. He offered the bottle to her.

“Is it sticky?” she asked.

“No, not at all,” he answered. Katara outstretched her hand to him and he gave her a generous helping of the cream.

“Thanks,” she said.

He said nothing more and kept the cream back in his bag. He crossed his arms against his chest, slouched, and looked out the window.

At some point in the journey, she noticed that he could not seem to get comfortable against the headrest. He undid the low bun against his neck and let his long, jet-black hair flow past his shoulders. He kept himself hunched over, almost looking like he was trying to hold himself together, and continued to only look out the window, fully content with watching the fields pass him by without a word passing through his lips.

Where her eyes were restless as they kept flitting between him, June, and the fields outside, so were her hands and her fingers. Half an hour into the journey — a half hour of uncomfortable silence — Katara just finished absentmindedly putting her long hair into a French braid. Zuko had practically not moved, lost in thought.

And it was half an hour into the journey that June had, apparently, had enough.

“So, braids,” she started, piercing through the heavy silence with crushing ease. “What’s your name?”

Katara stared her down through the front-view mirror and raised a brow at her. “I thought you didn’t give a shit.”

“I don’t,” June replied quickly as she rolled her eyes. “But my wife tells me I should try being nicer to people so, whatever, fuck it.”

Zuko looked at them both through the front-view mirror but said nothing. Katara sighed.

“Katara,” she said. “My name is Katara.”

“So, how’d you know Prince Pouty over here?”

Katara didn’t look at Zuko but from the corner of her vision, she could see his posture tense up.

“College,” she answered quickly, easily. She could feel the daggers his eyes were throwing at her but she kept going. “He was in my brother’s class—my brother and I shared a condo unit, he came over a few times. Met him then.”

“Huh,” said June with a click of her tongue. She looked to Zuko through the mirror. “I thought you didn’t have friends in the country, kid.”

He swallowed.

“I didn’t know she was here,” he grumbled. “College was a long time ago.”

“Uh _huh_ ,” June started. Silence prevailed for a breath or more. The car drove over a hump.

Katara didn’t know why she was so nervous. It wasn’t as if there was anything worse that June could do to her that she hadn’t already imagined. And Zuko, at the airport, had already assuaged any morbid kidnapping scenario that had played in her head at the offer. In truth, it was only his demeanour that made her think she had any reason to be uneasy at all. Katara did not know this woman and this woman did not know her—lying was always easier on a clean slate.

Finally, a sound was made.

June snickered. When she spoke again, her eyes were looking at Zuko through the mirror and he looked like he could not look away. “You know—the girl could get away with murder in court but you… you’d go to federal prison for jaywalking.” Zuko shifted where he was sat and rolled his eyes. Katara could not help but smirk as June added, “Lie better.”

“I’m not—” he tried.

“Give it up, I’m not going to call the cops,” said June. “I _really_ do not care. I don’t know what has you so wound up.”

“Just—” he said. “Are you going to tell my father?”

June scoffed. “I’d rather chew out my own tongue than willingly talk to that man, kid. _Fuck_ Ozai.”

Katara watched as Zuko swallowed and straightened his posture. He nodded once.

June looked to Katara then. “Girl, talk. Who are you _really_?”

“I—” Katara started. She met June’s eyes for a moment and considered sticking with the story, if only to save face. But one look at June and that piercing stare told her that there was simply no use. She picked her battles. She looked to Zuko again and he nodded at her, as if he were giving her his approval to come clean.

She sighed and explained, “I’m just a tourist. Zuko invited me to his house… and, you know, I don’t really want to be stuck in airline accommodation for weeks. We were supposed to be on the same flight and everything, and our flight went to hell so—”

June nodded and kept her eyes on the road. She switched gears with one hand and kept her other hand on the wheel. She overtook a slow, plumber’s van and drove on. She tucked in her lips and licked them. With the tip of her tongue, she pushed the inside of her cheek, withholding a chuckle.

“Okay…” June trailed off. “So, let me get this straight—” Katara and Zuko shared a split-second knowing look of panic and then back to her. “Some _random_ _guy_ in an airport, who you’ve _never_ met, asks you to live in _his house_ —”

“I know it sounds crazy!” she said.

“I know what it sounds like!” he said at the same time.

The pair of them were practically fighting off their seatbelts as they leaned forward to bellow their rebuttals at the driver. June only smirked. When she smiled, she could see her teeth, finally.

“Jeez,” she said. “Alright, quick question. Braids—you got a boyfriend?”

“My name is _Katara_.”

“I heard you the first time, _Katara_ ,” June mocked. “Answer the question, please.”

“No.”

“No, you won’t answer the question, or—”

“No, I don’t have a boyfriend.”

“Girlfriend?”

“No.”

June’s eyes went to Zuko, then. “What about you, Pouty?”

“No,” he grumbled as he looked to the view out the window. “To both.”

“Oh, sweet _Jesus_ ,” said June. She started to laugh. June shook her head and grinned like a Cheshire cat to herself, while her hands were firmly on the steering wheel. “This is _so_ stupid, it’s hilarious.” Neither of the pair could say anything and they only shifted uncomfortably in their seats. June continued. “Song will probably try to invite you two for dinner at some point.”

Katara’s eyes jumped between June, with her private jokes, and Zuko, with his self-made misery.

“Are you guys are supposed to be friends?” she asked Zuko.

“For lack of a better word,” he answered with a shrug of his shoulders.

“Hey,” said June. “If it weren’t for me, you’d still be in that fucking airport—”

“But you said you were alone,” said Katara, cutting June off. Zuko sat up a bit straighter.

“June and Song live in Bournemouth,” he explained. “It’s about an hour and a half from where I am and they’ve got a kid and this, like… _huge_ dog.”

“Her name’s Nyla,” June added. “She’s very sweet.”

“For an attack dog,” he countered.

“But then… where _are_ we going?”

“You don’t know where we’re going?” June asked in barely suppressed mockery.

“Okay, I’m going to need you to stop _judging_ me,” Katara scolded.

“Too late for that, kid,” said June, meeting her bark with bite of her own. “You’re lucky this one’s actually _not_ a serial killer… or else, I’d probably tell you to run.”

“That might be the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me,” said Zuko.

“I didn’t say it _to_ you, Pouty, I said it _about_ you; don’t get it twisted,” said June.

“But where are we going?”

“Dorset,” Zuko replied.

“Is it nice?”

“A lot of old white people,” he answered. “A lot of them are probably racist but they’re mostly too old to try anything. So it’ll be fine.”

“You’ve got nothing to worry about, Princess,” said June. “You lucked out. Trust me.”

* * *

Katara fell asleep in the car about an hour into the drive to Dorset. Zuko looked at her with her head against the window, sleeping soundly. Her mouth was wide open, a little bit of drool dripping down the side of her mouth. Zuko couldn’t help but smile and chuckle quietly to himself as he looked away, pretending not to have seen anything.

For the rest of the drive, he said virtually nothing else. In his head, he heard everything he could have said and everything he had just said. Something in him always wanted to go back and change what he’d said, a voice telling him that there was some way he could have said that better. He s wallowed and wiped his palms on the fabric of his trousers. He exhaled and dug his meticulously trimmed nails repeatedly on the skin of his sweaty palms.

He texted Song from the car about the situation with the flights and how he would be arriving with a friend he’d picked up. He apologised for the inconvenience of having to prepare for his re-arrival and his new guest, and she’d assured him that she would then get the house in order for him instead of prepping it for a prolonged abandonment like she’d thought. It was lucky that she hadn’t gotten far into the cleanup when his plans had been cancelled as they had been.

A better man, he thought, would have called Song instead of texted her. He would have told her the story at the airport, told her the whole story of finding Katara, told her of his sudden insanity, and he imagined that she would laugh at his foolishness, at his perceived kindness; tell him how he reminded her of his mother as she so often did, and Song would have asked more about Katara.

There was so much more that he could have said, he knew. But he didn’t. He’d only texted that he was bringing a friend to stay with him and that he would see her soon.

He was not a master conversationalist to begin with and there was nothing else to ask of June anyway. Where other people might have felt themselves trapped in the silence, he found his home in it. Keeping his voice to himself took years and years and years of fear and training, and he was not about to break it simply to adhere to some olden time, unspoken policy of universal friendliness or politeness.

Zuko was a young man who was no stranger to the art of keeping his words to himself, as he had raised himself to be. He knew of the art, yes, but by no means was this his craft.

In his fantasies, he imagined himself a man who could talk to this new… roommate, for lack of a better word. He didn’t know the first thing about her, other than what he could see and what he’d overheard. He knew that a better man might have asked her about her siblings, asked her about her why she’d ended up in this country, and ask her what she did for a living. In his head, he was a man who could say something clever and fun and she’d laugh, and it would make him smile. In his head, he imagined he was the kind of person who could make a friend as easily as children do.

These alternate universes lived only in his head as he watched the fields pass them by.

Eventually, he also fell asleep against the window and he was only woken by the sound of a nearby, rushing train. He saw the street signs pointing to Town Square, to Dorset County Hospital, to Brewery Square, to Dorchester West, and to Dorchester South. He reached over to Katara and tried to wake her with a few gentle taps to her arm.

Katara stirred awake and wiped her mouth with the sleeve of her jumper. She looked at him with a frown, clearly unhappy that she had been woken up. He made note of that in his head.

“What?”

“We’re nearly there.”

Katara looked out the window and saw the dark houses made of red brick and stone, the buntings made of Union Jack flags strung up on one house like there was anything to celebrate. They drove past a café, a gym, a Nando’s, and a Pizza Express before they turned left. They drove through the streets and pulled into Cromwell Road where the houses were all practically identical and also, still, made of red brick. June slowed to a stop to a modest, two-storey house. Zuko wiped his palms on his trousers again and tried to remind himself how to breathe.

June pressed on the horn twice and Song made her way out the white door to greet them. Zuko opened the door on his side and met her.

“Hi Song,” he said. He heard Katara’s door open and she walked over to them. To Song, he gestured to Katara with rehearsed politeness. “This is Katara. Katara, this is Song. June’s wife.”

“Kamusta ka naman, hija?” said Song, offering her outstretched hand.

Wordlessly, Zuko moved to the back of the van with June and helped her unload the bags from the trunk. They put the bags on the walkway. He knew that June could not be bothered to help them roll the bags all the way inside the house—an entire ten steps away. Still, he kept listening and watching the conversation with Song and Katara anyway.

“Hello, po,” she answered. She looked at her hand and hesitated. “Uh…”

“Oh, that’s right,” said Song. “Social distancing. But I… are you…?”

“Tested negative po just yesterday,” she said.

“That’s good! That’s good!” said Song. Just then, her son toddled up behind her and pulled on her dress. Katara waved at the boy.

“Oh, hi,” she said, her voice higher than he’d ever heard it before. “And what’s your name?”

“He’s still shy,” said Song. She sounded amused. “Come on, San. Say hi!”

Zuko looked over the van to watch the boy’s response. The kid only shook his head while looking straight at Katara, frowned, and his behind his mother’s skirts. He smiled to himself at the sight and unloaded his largest suitcase. June, on the other hand, took the car seat that had been tucked away at the back of the trunk and took it out. Without prompt or niceties, she started to attach the seat to the backseat where Zuko had been sitting.

“Come on, anak, say hi to Tita Katara—”

“That’s okay, it’s okay, he doesn’t have to,” she said, smiling at the child. “Hi, San. It’s nice to meet you.”

Zuko walked over to them then as he and June finished with their bags. Song turned to face him and smiled.

“Here are your keys,” she said, taking his hands in hers to give him the set of house keys. “ _Again_ ,” she added to tease him.

“She seems nice,” Song added in a whisper that only he could hear.

Zuko felt blood rush to his cheeks, he swallowed, and his skin tingled. He rolled his eyes and managed to smirk. Song continued, “Now… are you two going to be okay?”

“Yeah, Tita, we’ll be fine,” he said. “Thank you po talaga. Pasensya na ho sa abala.”

“Zuko, it wasn’t your fault. It really is fine, I promise,” she said. “Come on, anak. Say goodbye to Tito Zuko.”

San raised his small toddler hand, as if trying to reach up to Zuko, and closed and opened it slowly. A child’s version of a wave goodbye. Zuko smiled at the child and offered a hand for him to hi-five; the boy practically jumped at the chance and hi-fived Zuko’s hand with all his might. San nearly missed. He laughed. So did Song as she walked towards the passenger side door.

“Bye, kid,” he said as June picked up her son and strapped him into his car seat. Katara appeared by his side and waved goodbye to the child too.

“Thanks, June.”

“Yeah, whatever,” she said, facing him and putting a hand on her hip. “Call a cab company next time, Pouty.”

“She’s kidding!” Song called out from inside the car. “Anything you need, alright? Tawag lang kayo!”

June slid the back seat door shut and opened the driver side door. She gave a two-fingered salute to both him and Katara and said, “See ya, kids.”

The couple drove off. Zuko and Katara simply stood by their luggage and watched as the car disappeared from view. Neither of them wanting to be the one to break the ice or make the first move, recognising that this was now a reality that they had both put themselves in. Every atom in his body wanted to burst into flame. His eyes travelled every which way but at her.

But it was Katara who broke first, and quickly, and she said, “ _So…_ ”

Zuko took a deep breath. “Yep. Gone and done it now.”

“They were nice,” she said, trying to steer the conversation into anywhere else but neutral. “I mean, Song was.”

He managed a soft chuckle. “June’s an acquired taste.”

“So, are we going to go inside, or…?” she gestured. He turned to the door and to her, a look of bewilderment on his features, like a deer frozen and staring at oncoming headlights, and he nodded.

“Right,” he agreed. Zuko took the handle of his largest suitcase and started to roll it to his first front door. Katara followed him.

“Song was friends with my mother,” he explained as he carried his suitcase over the step. He opened the second front door and pushed the suitcase inside the house. “She takes care of the house, visits about twice a month to make sure the place hasn’t burnt down.”

He took the case Katara had rolled to him and he carried it inside. She walked back to the walkway and rolled two of the smaller cases in both hands. They repeated this cycle until Zuko had gotten all the suitcases inside the house.

“Why don’t you stay with them? Or get them to stay with you?”

“Look at this house. With me and them and their kid? And _Nyla_? We’d kill each other in two days.”

“Who lives in the house when you’re not here?”

“I let Song rent it out to tourists,” he said. “You know, AirBnB it.”

“You said this was your mom’s house.”

“It was,” he answered simply. Katara stopped in her tracks. All of the suitcases were in the house then. Zuko looked away from her then and cocked his head. “Come on in. I’ll give you a tour.”

Zuko pulled down the shoe rack to show her where her shoes were meant to go. By the door, he took off his boots while still standing. Katara did the same and leaned against the now closed first front door for balance. Boots in the shoe rack, they walked into the small foyer. The first thing you could see was a hallway where you could either go upstairs on the right side of the hallway or to the kitchen straight on to the left.

“It’s a two-storey house, wall-to-wall carpeting so I hoover the place up like once, maybe twice, a week.”

“Wow, don’t you just call someone in to do that for you?” she teased.

“I would but it’s not like I have a lot to do right now,” he answered simply, not a hint of a joke in his voice.

“Oh, I was—” she started but stopped herself midsentence. “Never mind.”

Zuko paused and blinked. The penny dropped.

“You were making fun of me.”

Katara tried to hide her laugh. “Sorry.”

He closed his eyes and sighed. He almost smiled. He felt a blush rise up his neck to his cheeks. “It’s fine.”

He gestured to the left where a predominantly peach-tinted room greeted them both. “This is the living room.”

In the living room, the first thing one could see was the fireplace. Red brick and well maintained. Above the mantle were little snowglobes from various European countries, an hourglass that had an intricate, golden middle with red liquid at the bottom, and tiny, wooden jeepney replicas from Manila and Cebu. The room smelled like roses and it felt warm. Above the mantle was a large, ornate antique mirror with a worn, golden frame. To the left of the fireplace was a peach-toned leather sofa that faced east with its back against the window. Next to that sofa was a desk with a detachable phone atop an antique, dark brown bureau.

To the right of the entrance was another sofa of the same colour but larger, facing north and the large, TV screen that was next to the fireplace. Standing with the TV was the wifi router and an original Nintendo Switch with the blue and red joy-cons. Beneath the TV was a PS4, several DVDs, and a small selection of books. In front of the larger sofa was a glass coffee table with some fashion, nature, and Good Housekeeping magazines beneath it.

“Wi-Fi password is underneath the router. TV’s set up with Netflix and Amazon Prime, you can use my account, it doesn’t matter to me. You can use the switch and the PS4 too, if you want.”

“Are all the books yours?” she asked.

“I mean… it is _my_ house. So, I guess?” he answered, scratching the back of his neck. “I mean, yeah, some of them were probably my mom’s? And sometimes, the guests that book this place steal a book. Sometimes, they leave one. So, it’s not all me. Haven’t read them all either.”

Past the living room was a small dining room with a circular glass table and four seats. Zuko guided her towards the spaces while keeping his hands in his pockets.

On the dining room’s east wall was a smaller black couch that has definitely seen better days. Next to it was a large houseplant – a potted bush of bird of paradise — with lush, green leaves and orange blooms. A singular piece of modern artwork hung on the western wall above the dining table (a simple white canvas with blue and red lines crisscrossing in a nondescript design) and a large, engraved, wooden spoon and fork from Baguio. The dining room’s north wall was actually a pair of sliding doors that led to a garden. Next to the black couch was a door that led to the kitchen.

The kitchen was largely dark auburn, thanks to the cherry wood cabinets. There were traces of silver steel—the washer and dryer beneath the countertops, as well as the coffee maker on the kitchen counters. On the kitchen counter was a bottle of UFC Banana Ketchup, Knorr’s Original Seasoning, brown sauce, sriracha, and a green, 16oz container of Tony Chachere’s Original Creole Seasoning. The refrigerator’s doors were even decorated with the same cherry wood, seamlessly blending to the rest of the kitchen’s motif. There were white plates drying on a dishrack and a fresh loaf of bread beneath a transparent breadbox embossed with ‘bread’ written in cursive on it.

“So, dining room. Kitchen. I don’t really eat in the dining room, though. I just sit on the big sofa in front of the TV.”

“Fair enough.”

“Unless you want to?”

“Want to what?”

“Eat in the dining room?”

“Oh, no—I mean, sure, yeah but it’s… you know, it’s just the two of us,” she said. “Sofa sounds about right.”

When they got to the kitchen, Zuko watched her go to the bread and lift the lid. She shut the lid down immediately and turned to face him.

“I can help with the food shops and stuff, you know? I don’t want to just leech off of y—”

“No,” he said immediately, raising a hand. “No, don’t even think about it. It’s fine. Really.”

“Then what—” she wanted to ask but he cut her off. Zuko felt blood rise to his cheeks, the heat of something acidic boiling from the pit of his stomach all up to his throat. He swallowed it down.

“You… you do enough by being here,” he said. “I couldn’t—I couldn’t ask anything more of you, it’s—”

“But I want to _help_ ,” she insisted. The middle of his chest felt tight; the feeling got tighter by the second. “I want to pull my weight.”

“Katara—”

“The whole point of why you asked me to come with you is so you don’t have to through this alone, right?”

“Katara—”

“Let me _help_.”

“Fine,” he spat, closing his eyes and sighing. “Fine, fine—just do it your way. Do what you want.”

“You don’t have to be rude about it,” she retorted, her voice clipped. He felt the hairs at the back of his neck stand on edge.

“I’m not being rude!”

“Don’t you raise your voice at me!”

“You raised your voice at _me!_ ” he said, taking a step back. His heart felt like it was starting to expand and break past his ribs, its racing beat taking over every part of him. He could feel his heartbeat in his fists and he dug his nails into his palms. Everything in his mind was telling him to take cover.

“Okay, stop!” she said. “We’re just going to go around in circles if we keep this up. You need to _relax_. I’m just trying to help you.”

“I don’t _need_ your—” he said on instinct, swallowing. But it was her turn to interrupt him.

“Do you want a fight?” she challenged. “Is that what you’re doing?”

“Obviously not—” he scoffed.

“Then what the hell are you getting at?” she asked. Her voice got faster as he saw the light of rage in her eyes burn brighter and brighter with every syllable. “Why are you making such a big deal out of literally nothing—what is _wrong_ with you? What the fuck is your problem?”

“I don’t have a problem!” Zuko blurted out. “I just… I just…” He felt heat rise up his face, just behind his eyes. Tears always burnt more painfully on the left side. He grit his teeth and exhaled sharply.

“Listen, it’s been a really long, shitty ass day for both of us,” he said. “Can we just… can we just deal with the chores or whatever it is you want later?”

He looked her in the eye and felt immediately that that was a mistake. He’d never known that brown eyes could look colder than ice but hers did. A stare so cold it burnt and cut. She crossed her arms across her chest. He swallowed.

“Fine,” she said. “ _Fine._ ”

“Let me show you to your room.”

* * *

Did she regret it?

Why did she agree to this?

Agreeing to spend an indefinite amount of time in a small, confined space with a complete stranger during a pandemic, not knowing if they would even get along in the first place, was not one of her best decisions, in hindsight. But his offer had, at the time, sounded like economic salvation. Now, she wondered what comfort really cost if she had to share a space with him if sharing a space with him meant more of situations like _that_.

The rage in her bones quelled almost as soon as she reached half the stairway, the tides of worry washing over her instead. _What had she just done?_

Up the stairs, there were four doors.

“This is the bathroom,” he said quietly, pointing to the door to the east. She said nothing. He kept walking and opened the door to the northwest, and he gestured for her to come inside. “This is the master bed.”

Before she stepped in, she doubled back and stared at him. Katara raised a brow. “Wait, what?”

“What do you mean?”

“Where will _you_ sleep?”

“The sofa downstairs folds out—”

“Zuko, that’s crazy,” she argued. “This is _your_ house, I can take the—”

“I _insist_ ,” he said, exasperated. “Please, Katara. Just take the room.”

The master bedroom had a bed that was the size of half her hostel accommodation. Her mouth hung open. Pale, peach closet doors surrounded the bed. The bed itself had lavish sheets that Katara guessed had a thread count in the thousands. Silk pillowcases on an absurd amount of pillows just for one person.

On either side of the bed were two bedside tables. There was a vase on the right table and on it were fresh white orchids and bushels of lavender; and two large, intricately decorated red candles each with three, previously lit wicks. On the left bedside table was an old-fashioned, white table lamp that matched the curtains. To the east of the bed was a sink with a light. On the sink was a large, clear glass bottle with a white label with black lettering that looked vaguely French. To the west, large windows framed by ornate white curtains with golden embroidery. The whole room smelt like flowers, particularly of lavenders. One whiff had her sighing in pure bliss.

Katara sat on the edge of the bed. Zuko stood by the door, arms folded across his chest, and leaned on the doorframe. She looked at the off-white, carpeted floor, and took a moment to absorb the situation she found herself in. In the corner of her vision, she saw a pair of fluffy, red indoor sandals that were decorated with a large, golden flame at the top of it. She breathed out a laugh.

“This is one of the craziest things I’ve ever done in my life.”

“One of?” he asked. She looked up at him and saw the beginning of a smirk on his lips.

“Yeah, you know,” she said. “Part of the reason why I’m here is a crazy idea. I was just here on holiday by myself when everything happened. Barely got to enjoy any of it. Then I just got stuck… and I kept getting stuck. Hell, my Oyster card still has 20 pounds in it.”

Zuko gave her a thoughtful look, without looking her in the eye as his was a busy gaze that kept flitting about the room, as he paused and then finally said, “That sounds rough.”

“Why are _you_ here?” she asked.

“My father,” he answered simply. “My sister was the one who was supposed to go on this business trip here because an old designer we usually get was putting out a collection early but Azula likes New York more and it was fashion week there so—” He stopped. “This is a lot. I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s okay,” she said. “You’re literally the first stranger I’ve spoken to in months. I can listen to you for days.” She saw him hesitate to meet her steadfast stare. “So, fashion week?”

“You know who my father is,” he answered. He shifted his weight and shrugged his shoulders. “We’re mostly sent on trips to purchase stuff for his store.”

“His _store_ —like it’s not the biggest rich-people department store in the country,” she commented lightly, rolling her eyes.

“It is what it is,” he said, shrugging again. “Buyers go to the fashion shows to pick out what the store will carry. That’s usually Azula’s job.”

“What was your job?”

“Digital campaigns,” he said. “Marketing. Stuff my father doesn’t really think is important.”

“So why you?”

“Honestly? He ran out of people to send. It’d be bad form not to send someone from the family to the show,” he answered. “And I already had my visa ready so I jumped at the chance, really. I was only supposed to be here about two months, max. Kept getting delayed. Flights kept getting cancelled.”

“Same here.”

“At first, I didn’t mind it. I kind of still don’t. My father and I don’t exactly see eye to eye when I’m home. I like it better here—when I’m farther away from that life.”

“That government,” she added. Zuko chuckled.

“Fucking tell me about it,” he said. “Agni, you know when you hate the government but everyone else in your house just fucking loves that guy no matter what kind of despicable shit he says?”

“Oh _no_.”

“Yeah,” he said. Zuko winced.

“Isn’t he—isn’t your father like a Mar—”

“An apologist?” he finished for her. “Oh yeah. Big time. He was nice to him back in the good old days.” Katara cringed. “I would say I hate him in public but I’m not too keen on getting another one to match.”

He said this quickly, nonchalantly, and flippantly as he gestured to his face—particularly, to the scar on his face. Katara didn’t quite know what to say. He’d said it like it didn’t even matter, like there was hardly anything questionable about what he’d just said. About what it meant.

‘ _Does that mean…_ ’ she started to think, but decided against speaking on it now. Not now.

“Spirits,” she settled on saying. “ _Keen?_ ”

“The little old white ladies around here can rub off on you. Next thing you know, you’re asking me I _get what you mean_ and you’re calling every other thing _lovely_.”

He put on an accent when he was trying to imitate said little old white ladies. Katara smiled.

“You?” he asked.

“What about me?”

“I—” he said. She swore she could watch the colour drain from his face, from joy to sudden fear. “I just mean… uh—what… what brings you here? Do you, like, uh—have a job back home?”

Katara smiled, lips pursing to the side as she considered him. “I… well, I _had_ a good job but some… pretty awful bosses. Evil, really. And I mean really, really evil. That and, you know, some other stuff that happened… it got to be too much so… I quit a good job that I loved and I was good at,” she said. “Wanted to get away from it. Heal or… something. So I had a bit in my savings… figured, fuck it, I would treat myself. Solo trip. First time out and just live. Have an adventure, make some stories and some friends, have fun holiday flings with people I’d never see again, and just… a month to myself and to relax. I was only here for a week before everything went into lockdown.”

“I’m really sorry,” he said. Katara pressed her lips together and with her shoulders, made the universal gesture of, ‘ _Well, what can you do?_ ’

“Yeah,” she said. “It’s a little bit of why I agreed to come here, you know?”

“Right,” he said. His face changed then, his expression turning serious. “I-I’m going to go over to Waitrose and pick some stuff up. You need anything?”

“Some shower stuff? Shampoo and whatever?”

“Is there a brand you like?” he asked. “A scent?”

“I—” she started. She felt a blush creep up her cheeks then and she did not understand why. “I—no, I—I’m not very picky. Anything you think is good, I guess.”

“Okay. Well, Song should have put some stuff in the shower so you can use that if you don’t want to wait,” he said. “Can I have your phone?” She reached in her pocket for her phone and handed it to him. He walked to her and as he stood, he put in his number.

“Just text me if you need anything else,” he said as he returned her phone to her. “And, uh… make yourself at home.”

He walked to the door. She called out to him just before he reached the stairs.

“Zuko?”

“Yeah?” he said, turning his head by just a fraction.

“Thank you,” she said. Zuko met her eyes and for the first time, he did not look away. He offered her a small, quick smile.

“I think I’m the one who should be thanking you,” he said. “And about earlier, I… I’m sorry.”

* * *

Katara heard the doors close and lock.

She peeked out the open door, as if she were sneaking around a place she was not supposed to be in, and crept around. Hers were quiet, careful footsteps. She picked up the glass bottle by the sink near the bed. It was near full and the label read, ‘ _Feuille de Lavande_ ’ and it was framed by the words ‘ _diptyque 34 boulevard saint german paris 5e_ ’. She uncapped the bottle and took a small whiff of the bottle and was immediately immersed in the scent of lavender.

“ _Oh my God,_ ” she whispered to herself. She put the bottle back where she found it and took a photo.

She opened the closets in the room and found that they were mostly empty. The closet door on the closet next to the sink had a full-length mirror. By the window was an antique bureau and when she checked the drawers, there was hardly anything in it, apart from some universal adaptors, a torch, a spiral notebook, and a black, ballpoint pen. When she walked to the right bedside table, the one with the flowers and the candles, she picked up the red candle. On the label was the name ‘ _diptyque’_ but instead of being black and white like the bottle, this candle was intricately decorated with illustrations of a hand, a green, four-leaf clover, a lucky cat, and a golden flower. Next to the label was a pink flower and a blue elephant. The red candles smelled like roses and of something else that was spicy and warm.

She took a photo of the table with the flowers and the candles.

She opened the door to the right of her room, the room directly in front of the stairs, and found that it was partly an office and a home gym. Zuko hadn’t introduced that room to her and assumed that it was his own private office. Make herself at home, he’d said to her, but she knew how to draw boundaries without having to be told. In the next room to the right was the bathroom, as he’d said.

You could fit three of the bathrooms she was used to into this one. Her mouth hung open at the size of the bathtub. He had one of those sleek, silver, rectangular waterfall showers just above it. Next to the bathtub was a radiator with drying racks attached to it. Above the radiator and by the bathroom’s windowsill was an identical glass, _diptyque_ bottle but this one said it was ‘ _Baies_ ’. This room smelled like roses, only sweeter. Like candied roses and berries. It was delightful. The toilet had an attached bidet and that alone made her mouth open wider in awe. On top of the sink was a full bottle of bright blue, liquid, Carex hand soap. She washed her hands. Next to the soap was a glass bottle with a black pump, its front had a large, ornate ‘E’ on it, also labelled ‘diptyque’. When she tried the pump, hand cream poured out. She brought her hands up to smell it, it smelled like an expensive garden. She pumped twice and slathered her hands in cream. To the left of the sink were small closets that when opened, contained big, fluffy white towels and bathrobes on the top shelves and bath accoutrements like oils and bubble bars and bath bombs and bath salts and the like on the bottom.

“ _Oh my God?_ ” she said, a little louder now, to no one else. She took out her phone, took photos of the room, with the intent of sending them to Suki and Sokka once she was connected to the house’s wifi.

When she left the bathroom, she checked what the last room was. It was to the left of the stairs when she was coming up. It was a closet of a room and a space that she was more familiar with. Just a generator and a boiler-like thing, some closets, and an ironing board.

Katara went downstairs, her footsteps quiet and muffled by the carpeted floors, and went to the WiFi router by the television. She put in the password to her phone. When she was connected, she immediately sent the photos she’d taken over to Suki and Sokka. Her message was delivered to both of them but not seen. When she checked the world clock, she came to the conclusion that her siblings were sound asleep. They would scream with her about the lavishness of the house later.

She opened up Google on her phone and put in the word ‘diptyque’. She could not recall how to spell the bottle in the bedroom but remembered the one in the bathroom. She searched for it on the company website and found that the bottle in the bathroom cost 50 euros. When she converted euros into Philippine peso and saw that it cost nearly 3,000 pesos, she yelled out, “ _Oh, my God!_ ” a third time.

“Rich people are insane,” she added in a whisper to this empty room.

Katara stood there and looked at the luxury in which Zuko found himself living. She grinned to herself, as if she could not quite believe this house, and laughed for no other reason than that.

She carried her largest suitcase up the stairs with considerable effort. It took her a solid ten minutes to get the suitcase up the stairs. It took another ten for her to carry the other three, smaller suitcases. From the largest suitcase, she took out a pair of pyjamas—an overly large, maroon shirt that read ‘ _Unibersidad ng Pilipinas_ ’ and some dark blue, crushed velvet sweatpants—and some underwear. She rushed to the bathroom, put her clothes by the windowsill, and spritzed the Baies room spray liberally around the room. She shut and locked the bathroom door. From the closet, she took a large, fluffy towel and bathrobe and hung it up on the hook by the door.

Katara then undressed and put her long, thick hair up in a bun with the tiniest hair tie that had been on her wrist. She opened Spotify on her phone and put the album, ‘ _Wasteland, Baby!_ ’ (2019), on a loop and she placed her phone by the windowsill next to her clothes. The opening drums to _Nina Cried Power_ blast through the room. When she stepped into the shower, she pulled at the shower curtains out of habit, and she saw that there were two bottles on the shower rack hanging on the tube connected to the showerhead. The thin, white bottle with a black cap was also diptyque and the label read, ‘L’Ombre dans L’Eau’. It smelled like the Baies spray. The other shower gel was nearly identical in every way, except it was orange.

“ _Oh… my God?_ ” she said again. “I don’t even want to know how much this costs…”

She turned the knob for hot water and soon surrounded herself with steam. It was the nicest shower she’d had in months. She tried not to think about how she was taking it in a stranger’s house. It helped that she could hear Hozier in the background and she sang along to the song, having listened to nothing else but that album since it had been released. She knew every word.

Katara took her long, sweet time in the warm shower and she only got out when _Dinner & Diatribes_ started playing. She dried herself off, got dressed, put on the bathrobe for good measure, and wiped the fog away from the mirror. She took a long look at herself and forced herself to breathe deeply. The scent that surrounded the room made her bones feel more relaxed; the sweetness of it all calmed her. She stopped her music, took her dirty clothes, and pocketed her phone.

When she left the bathroom, she heard loud banging coming from downstairs. She rushed to put her dirty clothes on top of her open luggage haphazardly. She rushed down the stairs and immediately saw that Zuko had returned. He was struggling to open a plastic, orange bottle with a blue label and cap. He then hit the cap against the edge of the counter, hence making the banging sound.

“Are… you okay?” she asked as she neared him. He didn’t flinch, too concentrated on the task at hand.

“Yeah, I’m fine, it’s just—” he said, trying again. The cap looked like it was slippery and his hands simply couldn’t get enough grip and friction to get it open. When he spoke, it was through grit teeth. “Stupid thing won’t open.”

Katara chuckled and took the bottle from his hands. “Spirits, okay—just give it to me.”

She could not open the bottle either.

“Do you have a rubber band or something?”

“Why?”

“Just give me it,” she said, curt and quick. Zuko opened a drawer and gave her a laughably large, beige rubber band. She choked back a laugh. He looked at her quizzically as she wrapped the band around the cap. Once fully wrapped, she twisted the cap just ever so slightly to let the carbonated air through. It fizzed and then calmed down. She opened the bottle all the way and handed it to him.

“How did you get by through life not knowing how to do that?” she asked.

He held a hand up when she tried to hand him the drink and said, “No, it’s for you.”

She smelled the drink and looked at the label. It read ‘ _Irn Bru_ ’. She asked, “Orange beer?”

“It’s not beer,” he said. “It’s soda. It’s Scottish. Try it.”

Katara took a careful sip. Her eyes went wide, lines formed between her brows, and she stared at Zuko in open-mouthed shock.

“Holy shit,” she said. “How does this taste exactly like Bazooka bubble gum? But it’s a _drink?_ ”

“I know, right?” he agreed, giving her a small smile. He leaned against his kitchen counter and pocketed his hands. “You said you were only here for a week and you didn’t get to enjoy your vacation very much. I thought, starting with this… I mean, I don’t know, I thought something new and foreign for you to experience. There’s some other stuff around the area that might make your stay here worthwhile too. There’s a beach we could drive to about half an hour away. We could get Domino’s on the way back.”

“Zuko… why are you doing all this?” she asked, her voice quieter than before. Utter disbelief.

“Katara, you’re doing me a favour by staying here with me,” he said.

“Oh, yeah,” she retorted, sarcasm dripping with her every syllable. “It’s a _huge_ favour to stay in a house rent-free with free food and no bills to pay.”

“With a _complete_ stranger—some grown man you don’t know,” he argued. “It’s… it’s why I couldn’t ask you to do anything while you’re here. I don’t—I don’t want you to think that… that I brought you here for any other reason than what I asked.” Katara’s shoulders dropped. Zuko licked his lips, shrugged, and continued, “I just… I just want to prove to you that I’m not a creep or… anything else you might think about me.”

“I don’t know much about you, to be honest,” she replied, her voice gentler now. She leaned on the counter across from him and took another sip of her soda. “I’ve heard of you, sure, I mean—who hasn’t? But I… I _believe_ you.”

Zuko nodded. His lips quirked up for a split-second, an almost smile.

“But I need _you_ to know…” she continued. “When you asked me to come live in your house with you, you weren’t adopting a rescue dog. You basically asked me to be your roommate. And living with other people means that you and I are probably going to have to figure out how to get along. So, something you should know about me right here, right now, is that I’m not satisfied with being a trophy. I _work_. I _earn_ my keep. Or else, I go insane. And as much as I appreciate this offer, Zuko, you have to know that I’m not just going to sit here and spend your money. That’s not me. That’s not how this is going to work. You get it?”

He paused. She watched him consider her words and she stared him straight in the eye, though he would not really meet hers. She watched him swallow and then nod again.

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I get it.”

“And besides, I like to think I’m pretty good at reading people,” she said, raising the bottle at him in a ‘cheers’-like gesture. “I’ve met plenty of creeps. You don't have the vibe.”

Zuko looked puzzled. “…Thank you?”

“Thank _you_ ,” she said, taking a swig of the soda.

“So…” he said.

“So…” she echoed.

A shared moment of silence.

“Pizza Express for dinner?” he asked.

“ _Fuck_ yes.”

* * *

That evening, after dinner, Zuko retreated to his home office. Katara was sitting on the bed which was hers for the duration of her stay in this house, which she still found ridiculous. She had her phone raised to her face and the bedroom door was wide open. On the screen was her sister-in-law who was on loud speaker and was giving her a smug look.

“So, he’s not a serial killer, then,” Suki asked over the phone.

“Nope,” Katara answered.

“I want to meet this guy,” said Sokka, pushing into view. “Let me talk to him.”

“Sure,” she replied. Katara hopped off the bed and went to Zuko’s home office.

“Hey, knock knock,” she said as she knocked. “You busy? Can I come in?”

Zuko opened the door. His long, black hair was up in a half-ponytail. It suited him, she thought, though he looked confused.

“Yes?” he asked.

“My brother and my sister-in-law want to meet you,” she said.

“Oh, uh, yeah—” he said, opening the door. “Yeah, sure, come in.”

He sat on his office chair and wiped his hands repeatedly on his sweatpants. Katara raised her phone and flipped the camera to show him.

“Here he is!”

“Hello,” he said. He gave a short wave. “Zuko, here.”

“Have you met other humans before?” Katara asked, peering at him from behind her phone. “Like ever? In your life?”

“Not quite like this,” he replied with a hint of casual arrogance.

“Let him see us!” said Suki. Katara flipped the phone camera again and placed her phone on his desk, making it lean on the monitor of his iMac. He had an excel file open with numbers and letters she couldn’t make sense of. Katara crouched to be in the same frame as Zuko as they talked to her siblings.

“Hi Zuko,” said her sister-in-law. “I’m Suki. This is my husband, Sokka. Thank you so much for taking care of Katara for us.”

“Oh, I’m not—” he stammered. Katara turned her head to watch his face and she saw his complexion turn red. She smirked without realising it. “I’m just—I, uh—it’s, you know, it-it’s just a _house_ and I—”

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” Sokka interrupted. “Just listen, pal. You’re doing my sister a solid with all this but the _second_ you try anything, pakshit kang tarantado ka, humanda ka lang, ‘la akong pake kung sino ka—”

“O-kay!” said Katara, snatching her phone from his desk. “That’s enough of Sokka for today. Thanks, Zuko!”

She could not leave the room fast enough. She mouthed ‘sorry’ at him before she left his office and he only looked more puzzled than ever, this time with an added flush of red on his cheeks.

“Hey, I wasn’t finished!” Sokka said.

Katara returned to her room and shut the door.

“I can take care of myself!” she said to Sokka. “All of this is already weird as shit, I don’t need you making it _even weirder_ for me right now!”

“He’s kinda hot, though,” said Suki.

“Suki!” Sokka complained.

“Like… I’m just _saying_ —” she said.

“You are on _loudspeaker!_ ” Katara said.

“I am _married_ ,” said Suki. “But I am _looking_ … respectfully.”

“And I am _right_ here, babe!” Sokka complained again.

“And you’re seeing what I’m seeing!” she argued at her husband. “I _dare_ you to tell me that I’m wrong.”

“Whatever—the point is, he’s a _guy_ ,” said Sokka, now addressing Katara. “He’s this really hot, super rich guy with like, y’know, probably a dark, emo backstory who offered you shelter during a fucking pandemic—Katara, you’re literally in a goddamn teleserye. Like this is some primetime Metro Manila Film Festival shit.”

“Oh, my God—Sokka, Sokka, Sokka,” Suki started, her voice high and excited. Katara saw her pulling at Sokka’s arm. She brought her voice down to a mocked not-really whisper. “And they were _roommates!_ ”

“ _Oh my God, they were roommates,_ ” he replied instantly.

“Remind me of the point you’re trying to make again?” Katara asked.

“I’m just saying be careful out there,” said Sokka.

“And use protection!” Suki added.

“ _Suki!_ ” said the siblings at the same time.

“Oh, and be nice to him!” Suki added again, unapologetic.

“I’m nice to everybody!” Katara argued.

Then, a knock came at the door. The couple kept quiet and Katara looked at the door.

“Yes?” she called out.

“The walls are… _really, really_ thin,” said Zuko from the other side of the door. “I can still hear you, just so you know.”

Suki burst out laughing.

* * *

When Katara hung up on them, Suki and Sokka gave each other a long look.

“She’s totally going to sleep with him, isn’t she?” Suki asked.

“I do _not_ want that image in my brain right now,” he replied. “Or ever.”

“But she’s definitely gonna—” Suki pressed.

“Yeah, I _know._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Kamusta ka naman, hija?” (How are you, dear?)
> 
> “Thank you po talaga. Pasensya na ho sa abala.” (Thank you, really. So sorry for the trouble.)
> 
> "Pakshit kang tarantado ka, humanda ka lang, ‘la akong pake kung sino ka—” (Fuck you, asshole. You better prepare yourself. I don't care who you are—)
> 
> "Kuya" is a Filipino honorific that literally means older brother, though it can also be used on others who are only slightly older than you. "Ate" is also an honorific, but it means older sister. "Tito" is uncle and "Tita" is aunt, but this can also be used for people who are significantly older than you even though they are not related to you in any way whatsoever, as a sign of familiarity and respect.


End file.
